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In this second part of our blog post about E3, Geneviève talks about the most interesting things she saw, and recaps the highlights from the show. Our first part of this included Rich's thoughts, which you can read about here.

Geneviève E3 Thoughts

PC Gaming Show

The indies really shone during the presentation by PC Gamer, which is always a hopeful thing to witness. Also, I couldn’t help but notice all of the Community Managers representing their game on stage. Maybe one day…

Here are thoughts on some of the games shown:

Satisfactory, which seems to play somewhat like No Man’s Factorio, wins the prize for best game name.

There seems to be a new genre in indies: taxi driver games. Between Neo Cab’s futuristic dystopian Uber vibes, and Night Call’s Noir fiction atmosphere, the future promises opportunities to nosily explore the lives of passengers while trying to solve a greater mystery. The idea of using fleeting social encounters to paint a bigger picture certainly sounds interesting.

Untitled Publisher appeared and introduced three eye-catching games. Bravery Network looks like a Cartoon Network fighter and… smoocher? Morning Star cleverly taps into everyone’s play-farming desires before lifting the curtain and offering something much, much bleaker. Finally, Overwhelm (which is out now!) looks like a stylish and juicy pixel art shooter metroidvania. That string of words is music to my ears.

The game I am by far the most excited for in the PC lineup is Sable, an absolutely breath-taking exploration game with an underused graphic novel art style. Just upload my soul straight into this game, please and thank you.

On the other hand, my favorite segment was when they showed Two Point Hospital. A completely bonkers game and some brilliantly handled technical difficulties came together to create an adorkable presentation. This is exactly why the PC Gaming Show is my favorite every year since its inception: the vibe is gleefully casual and wholesome, in no small part thanks to Sean “day[9]” Plott who is crazily charming as a presenter and totally an inspiration for me as a public figure in games.

Other highlights: Jurassic World Evolution’s trailer was narrated by Jeff Goldblum (yaass); Stormland looks gorgeous but is a VR game (boo); Klei is being delightful as ever with their upcoming expansion Don’t Starve: Hamlet; the ambitious Noita is a procedurally-generated rogue-like where each individual pixel responds to physical events (!); Ooblets looks ever so jolly but gameplay remains a mystery; and finally Maneater had the best trailer and I won’t say more because you should just watch it.

Others

EA simultaneously announced and released Unravel Two, a magical-looking co-op (or solo) sequel to the game that charmed us with its adorable yarn character on a mission. Their other game that caught my eye was Sea of Solitude, which seems both vibrant and gloomy and has got me under its spell.

Microsoft showed gameplay footage of Ori and the Will of the Wisps, which somehow looks even prettier and more endearing than the first game.

Sony went all out with the queer in their trailer for The Last of Us Part II, and if you hadn’t heard this already, I’m not sure how you managed that. In any case, it was a beautiful trailer for sure, and the contrast between Ellie’s normal romantic teenage life moment and her fighting in a post-pandemic world was striking to say the least. I wonder how (or if) that will translate in the actual game.

Ubisoft’s trailer for Beyond Good and Evil 2 was also cinematically pretty awesome, with an exciting reveal of Jade’s presence in the game, which fueled both my excitement at the promise of this prequel and my anticipation about whether it’ll feel anything like the original.

Of course we were also treated to more cinematic footage for Kojima’s unquestionably unique brain-child Death Stranding. It’s starting to make more sense, but also, kind of not? The very first shot of the trailer might encapsulate my feelings at this point most aptly. (Look it up, you won't be disappointed.)

One thing I did not see coming was Captain Spirit, a standalone game in the Life is Strange universe about an imaginative young boy, as well as my strong interest for it. I haven’t engaged with the LiS games at all, but there’s something about the magic of childhood imagination that looks so beautifully captured that I want to experience it.

In the midst of their totally unhinged “fake” conference, Devolver Digital announced My Friend Pedro, a tactical shooter platformer where you embody a character who is just as graceful as he is badass. Ballet, gunfights, and skateboards? I’m in.

Finally, Nintendo’s e-presentation showed the same kind of restraint we’ve come to expect from them in terms of announcements about their franchises. In short, the trailer for Mario Party showed some interesting use of the Switch’s touch screen, other party games like the indies Killer Queen Black and Overcooked 2 (which has online multiplayer!) are also coming to the console, and the Super Smash Bros. Ultimate announcement alone took up over 20 minutes of air time, which was interesting but a little weird.

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That's all for our E3 talk, hope you enjoyed, and look forward to another blog post soon!